Aggregate rent asked is calculated by adding all of the rents for vacant-for-rent housing units in an area. Aggregate rent asked is subject to rounding, which means that all cells in a matrix are rounded to the nearest hundred dollars. (For more information, see "Aggregate" under "Derived Measures.")

Question/Concept History

Since 1996, the American Community Survey questionnaires provided a space for the respondent to enter a dollar amount. The words "or mobile home"
were added to the question starting in 1999 to be more inclusive of the structure type. Since 2004, contract rent has been shown for all renter-occupied housing units. In previous years (1996-2003), it was shown only for specified renter-occupied housing units.

Comparability

Data on contract rent in the 2012 American Community Survey should not be compared to Census 2000 contract rent data. For Census 2000, tables were not released for total renter-occupied units. The universe in Census 2000 was "specified renter-occupied housing units" whereas the universe in the ACS is "renter occupied housing units," thus comparisons cannot be made between these two data sets.